Which Language Should I Learn?

[lord of the mark]

I would also point out - the other day I opened an English - Arabic dictionary, and was amazed how many words i kinda sorta knew. And as I think you are aware, my Hebrew is pitiful. And the grammar is related too. Arabic would be easy. But I guess if you guys arent even going to Sinai anymore, let alone Cairo or Jordan, its not useful the way you want it to be. (apparently reading Maimonides in the original is not high on your list of priorities )

Spanish is more important here (but no, all the Koreans and Chinese and Africans and Arabs here are busy learning English, not Spanish, so I guess you wont need Spanish to get by here in your lifetime (well outside of SOME counties) Spanish is of course mainly useful for all of Latin America.

Since youre not located here, though, Id pick French - it gives you France, Belgium, Switzerland, half of africa, and if you do by some chance see a warmer peace with your neighbors, it would be helpful there (given that youve given up on Arabic)

Oh, and French could be helpful with some of your olim chadishim

Im not sure that Chinese is THAT impossible. Right now POTM is taking Japanese, just cause she and her friends think its cool (Ive pointed out to QOTM that Japan will still be economically important for a long time as well, so its not just a frivolity - and having learned hirigana and katakana, she is now learning kangi - chinese characters - which should at least give her some reading knowledge of Chinese) She finds herself tripping up between Hebrew and Japanese occasionally.

[Meticulous Man]

I need another language to open up more parts of the world for me. For living there, traveling there, working for or with local companies, etc.

Arabic is useless for all of that. For the foreseeable future I won't be able to enter Arab countries. Most Arab companies will not be dealing with Israeli companies or Israelis from non-Israeli companies. So, it's pointless. Learning a language so that I'll be able to chat with Mustafa the falafel seller is not really productive.

Not that I have much experience in this area but I have the feeling that English nowadays suffices for traveling, business etc purposes quite well. So I think Arabic would be more useful in the sense that you would have some kind of an understanding of Arabic culture and stuff like that.

[MikeH]

If you already speak English there's no point learning another one.

[Heresson]

polish

[Eli]

Heresson:

I believe we've been through the fake and unimportant languages part.

Mike:
That's a good point actually. I'll have to think about it.

Aivo:
I can get an understanding of Arabic culture without learning the language.

LOTM:
As appealing as Maimonides is, I'll have to live without the pleasure.

And you're right about the new immigrants. They French are flooding Ashdod for the last few years. I keep hearing the language everywhere. They're also loud as hell. There is a French family leaving on the first floor and I swear that I'll start calling the police on them.

[Aro]

Well, I'm here to say the obvious truth: you should learn Portuguese...

And I should learn English...

[Winston]

Learn Danish and report back on your progress in oh, 2046.

[Ari Rahikkala]

Learn C, you hippies!

[Aro]

Portuguese is a very musical languages. But is for fun: If you want to be rich, learn Mandarin. The real money is over there.

[SlowwHand]

If you're coming to the States, I'd recommend Spanish.

[Main_Brain]

How about learning Yiddish?

[Eli]

Why would I learn a dead language?

[Barnabas]

Originally posted by Aro
Portuguese is a very musical languages. But is for fun: If you want to be rich, learn Mandarin. The real money is over there.

Only brazilian portuguese sounds great





European portuguese is very very ugly



*

Eli If you learn Spanish it gives you Spain, Spanish America from Mexico to Argentina, and you can understand much of italian and portuguese.

And yes we use this

¿?¿?¿?


French gives you France, half of belgium, luxembourg, the calvinist bit of switzerland, former african colonies of France, and it is largely spoken in morocco, Algeria and Lebanon I think.


Spanish has a much easier pronounciation than french, and the spelling system is almsot completely phonetic, you see a word for the first time and always know how to pronounce it.

[lord of the mark]

Originally posted by Eli
Why would I learn a dead language?

for many reasons, none of which involve living and working in a foreign country though.

If you WERE interested at all in Yiddish for cultural reasons, that would add weight to learning German, since with that, Hebrew, and Russian youd probably understand Yiddish almost completely with little further study.

[Wernazuma III]

Originally posted by Chilean President™
We do et Français aussi

I had the disputable joy of learning Inglich and fransé at the Liceo B-17, Santa Cruz de Colchagua. Our Inglich miss was a complete failure. On a more general side, the English teaching in Chile is a disaster, unless you have a former-exile teacher. French wasn't that bad, actually.



I'd also recommend Spanish - it opens up a bigger area than French, it's more beautiful and easier to learn. That's +++.
And you should better forget your dislike of German, "sonst komm ich und versohle deinen Judenhintern". OK, that example didn't do a favor to the cause.